American, British and French fighter pilots have been battling together since the first generation of fighter aircraft flew over Europe during World War I.

One hundred years later, that tradition is continuing at Langley Air Force Base with pilots of fourth- and fifth-generation aircraft training for what the future will bring.

The exercise is called Atlantic Trident 17. It kicked off Wednesday and will run through April 28, featuring the most advanced fighter jets in the NATO alliance.

The pace of the exercise was evident Thursday afternoon as sleek, delta-winged Dassault Rafale fighters from the French Air Force roared off the runway followed by the American F-22 Raptor and the Royal Air Force Eurofighter Typhoon.

Other aircraft will join the fray later this month as the exercise evolves to higher forms of simulated combat. Neighbors at Langley AFB might look up and see F-15E Strike Eagles from Mountain Home AFB in Idaho or an E-3A Sentry AWACS coming in from Tinker AFB in Oklahoma.

The French Acrobatic Patrol, the flight demonstratio team of the French Air Force, performs a show and Langley Air DOrce Base to honor the 100th anniversary of the U.S. entering WWI. British and French fighter aircraft joined the F-22 at Langley Air Force Base for joint opeartions called Atlantic Trident.

(Rob Ostermaier/Daily Press)

Langley's own complement of T-38 Talons, the black-painted trainer aircraft, will also play a role.

But here in the early stages, the American, British and French pilots are getting to know each other, both in the sky and in the briefing room.

Wing Commander Chris Hoyle, who commands a historic squadron of Typhoon jets, said the exercise is starting with small formations as individual pilots joust with each other. It allows them to explore capabilities and limits of each aircraft.

As the exercise moves into its second and third weeks, the formations and simulated missions will become more complex. Eventually, the Raptors, Typhoons and Rafales will do battle with the F-15s and T-38s, which will assume the role of adversary aircraft.

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An F-35 Lightning II will also arrive at Langley. It will mark the first time ever that the fifth-generation F-35 and F-22 have trained alongside their fourth-generation counterparts from France and the United Kingdom.

That offers great potential and a few challenges. An important part of Atlantic Trident 17 will be learning how to communicate between these fourth- and fifth-generation aircraft.

The fifth-generation aircraft have highly advanced and secretive sensors that allow them to gather more information than their fourth-generation counterparts. But the Raptor cannot yet send encrypted information and messages to the British and French aircraft.

That's not by design. The Air Force wanted to produce Raptors in large numbers; it was thought that the aircraft would mostly communicate with each other. But defense budget cuts capped production short of 200 aircraft, which means the Raptor must team up with fourth-generation aircraft whose communications system don't exactly match.

Lt. Col. Habu Young, commander of the 94th Fighter Squadron at Langley, said meeting those communication challenges is a large part of the exercise.

"That's a lot of what we're doing in our mission planning and our briefings," he said. "It's teaching them where the F-22 is going to be."

Lt. Col. Charles-Edouard Soidet of the French Air Force said the Rafale plays a complementary role with its ability to fire multiple air-to-air missiles. Hoyle said the Typhoon plays the same sort of role.

"In any large force deployment, the chances are, depending on the scale of the mission, that air-to-air missiles may well become the critical factors," Hoyle said. "We're going to be the 'missile truck,' effectively."

By comparison, the Raptor is more like the "quarterback" of the formation.

As the pilots look to the future, they remain mindful of the past. The 94th Fighter Squadron is the second-oldest flying unit in the United States. It flew the first patrol by an all-American squadron in France during World War I.

That sense of history is "very important," said Soidet.

Last year at this time, he witnessed the ceremony where four F-22 Raptors flew over the Lafayette Escadrille Memorial in Marnes-la-Coquette, France, to honor the 268 Americans who joined the French Air Force before the U.S. officially engaged in World War I.

Hoyle said the bonds between the British, French and American forces are unshakeable, particularly when it comes to their air forces. One of the greatest U.S. fighter pilots of all time, Robin Olds, served with Hoyle's squadron on exchange, for example.

"Our bonds are very close and they run deep," Hoyle said. "This is the future of combat in NATO as far as I'm concerned. We need to keep evolving and training together."